Building a unique resume story is both exhilarating + rigorous. It is a process of weaving common threads while also being true to the non-linear complexity.
In fact, one of the reasons I arise at 5am to embark on a 3+ mile jog + subsequent weightlifting is to gird me for a very rigorous writing strategy + client collaboration day ahead.
A Unique Resume Story Plunges Into Seas of Complexity
Investing 30 to 45 minutes to write just 2-3 lines for an executive career story is NOT that uncommon. Stepping deep into the seas of complexity requires swimming against the current–a time-consuming, concentrative act.
The life of an executive career writer is riddled with rigor. It also is exhilarated with moments of aha as the words connect, flow and anticipatorily zoom across the page.
- What will the next chaptered section illuminate?
- How will the suspense convert to measurable reality?
- What mountains will the key players traverse in order to achieve cultural cohesiveness and customer growth?
- How will revenue turn from sagging to explosive?
- Where will the executive (CEO, COO, CTO, CRO, etc.) adventure next?
- Will it be with a newly-organizing enterprise startup? Or, shall they explore opportunities within an existing large organization struggling to modernize legacy systems?
These are the thoughts this executive resume writer experiences amid the whirling stories of career-ambitious clients.
Deliberating deeply helps to sow seeds that not only bloom more richly, but also creates a sustainable garden of content. For example, while it is easy to start with the measurable result, such as:
BEFORE: Grew revenue 85% YOY through systems + business plan improvements.
It is more meaningful to traverse the intellectually difficult roads leading to the robust story around that metric, as we did here:
AFTER: Revenue exploded 85% at ABC Co. by steering sea of disparate functions through storms of change while influencing buy-in to modernization goals. Transformed mature technology consulting businesses, crafting + implementing start-up business plan across 29 unique global functions. Reorganized + inspired 12 teams from dispirited to high-performing solutions-specialists that resolved multimillion-dollar data risk + security issues.
An Executive Resume Delves Beyond the Pithy Paragraphs
But it goes beyond just fleshing out pithy paragraphs of contextual detail, and also extends to creating a cohesive, yet liberated multi-page narrative. Especially for CEOs and other C-suite leaders; i.e., CTOs, CFOs, CMOs, CCOs, CHROs, COOs and beyond, the storied chapters must build momentum around a theme of value drivers, while keeping a loose grip on the storyline.
Probably one of the biggest mistakes — and an idea I consistently must ‘push back’ on when collaborating with executive clients on their career story — is this idea of a straight-line, pop-pop-pop (fit the puzzle pieces neatly ‘here, here and here’ approach) to craft their narrative.
A Non-Linear Approach to Your Unique Resume Story
So many people believe that their executive resume story should be linear, when in fact, it is more riveting when you draw out the complexities in a cohesive, but not-so-perfectly linear outcome. Personal branding is not just an orderly collaboration of keywords designed for the attention-deficited social networking grazer.
Instead, executive career marketing is meant to satiate the appetites of that <1% of hiring board members seeking that needle in a haystack CEO (COO, CTO, etc.). They want to know MORE not less.
Therefore, you should embrace the complexity – and a bit of messiness – while still painting a picture that is cohesive and will make visual and auditory sense to the right reader. And, clients consistently tell me that the executive resume process, despite the rigor, is ultimately calming. As they commit to the process, they experience and embrace aha, exhilarative realizations.
By first parachuting into the details to marinate and deliberately pulling through the right ingredients, you can ensure contextual flavor. And then by stepping courageously into the seas of complexity, you enable the waves of your unique resume story, guided by the winds of your target audience goals, to take you to new ports of career innovation.
The results will amaze you.
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Dip your toes in the water of my executive resume process with my low-cost and recently enhanced Exec Resume Starter Kit. Email me for more information at jacqui@careertrend.net.
I am Jacqui Barrett-Poindexter, one of only 50 certified master resume writers and have crafted more than 1,500 career stories that put ‘your value into words.’ My bachelor’s in writing/journalism allows me to apply a journalist’s eye to your career.
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